CAPITOL HILL – Major parts from the Navy’s abbreviated class of Zumwalt destroyers (DDG-1000) will be integrated into the service’s program to replace the aging fleet of guided-missile cruisers, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson said on Tuesday. Read More →

Dr. N. Benjamin Barnea is sworn in to the U.S. Navy Reserve Medical Corps by Lt. Sheree Williams in 2010. US Navy Photo

The chief of the Navy Reserve told a key Senate subcommittee that she is “only able to accept 25 percent of applications from separating [active] sailors” because of high retention rates in her command, but also that the reserve has had some trouble filling reserve billets for unrestricted line officers and medical professionals. Read More →

The Senate Appropriations Committee on Defense (SAC-D) supports the U.S. Navy request for $403 million to continue the development of the Unmanned Carrier Launched Airborne Surveillance and Strike (UCLASS) aircraft — with conditions. Read More →

Senate defense appropriators set aside billions for Navy coffers in its version of the Pentagon’s Fiscal Year 2015 spending plan, giving service leaders the green light to move ahead on key maritime and aviation priorities. Read More →

The Navy has selected a design concept to replace its nuclear guided missile submarines (SSGNs), NAVSEA officials told USNI News in an interview last week.

Late last month NAVSEA and the Navy settled on a design concept for the Virginia Payload Module, a $743 million design change in the Virginia-class nuclear attack submarines (SSN-774) that will eventually replace the current Ohio-class SSGNs as part of the Block V iteration of the attack boat. Read More →

Congress closed its 2010-2012 session by passing a fiscal package that delays deep cuts to the defense budget and other executive branch agencies for two months, averting the “fiscal cliff” that threatened to slash nearly $50 billion from DOD’s 2013 appropriations ledger.

The negotiations offered a very public look at the high-drama posturing that has become a hallmark of dealings between the White House and Capitol Hill. To many casual observers, the back-and-forth signaled a new low in relations between the two branches, but to many on the inside, it was symptomatic of the legislative process that grinds on every day, usually outside of public view.

The hard work of crafting bipartisan legislation may take months of talks behind closed doors but produce only a few days of newsworthy drama. The annual National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) is one of those must-pass measures that enjoy overwhelming bipartisan support but take months of meetings, briefings, hearings and tense negotiations among members of the House and Senate from both sides of the aisle and DOD. The Hill and Pentagon trade budget requests, legislative proposals, cost estimates, testing data, planning documents and long-term strategy to craft each year’s spending priorities and an overarching national-security policy. The House Armed Services Committee (HASC) leads the four defense committees each year, followed by House and Senate Defense Appropriators — the HAC-D and SAC-D — and finally the Senate Armed Services Committee — SASC.